Hoffman Center Blog

Ismet Prcic kicks off the 2012 Manzanita Writers' Series season with a reading from his novel, Shards.

Ismet Prcic will read from his novel Shards at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at 7pm on Saturday, February 18, 2012 at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita. This event kicks of the 2012 series, now in its fourth year.

Also at the Saturday event, we’ll unveil the first edition of the new literary journal, the North Coast Squid, with selections from a variety of writers who have a connection to the local area.

Shards is a novel about a young Bosnian, also named Ismet Prcic, who has fled his war-torn homeland and is now struggling to reconcile his past with his present life in California.

It’s a harrowing war story, a stunningly original coming-of-age novel, and a heartbreaking saga of a splintered family. Shards has been listed as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, a Chicago Sun-Times Best Book of the Year, an Oregonian Top 10 Northwest Book of the Year, and shortlisted for the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award and the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize.

Prcic has gotten positive reviews for his first novel:

“Prcic captures the insanity of war and its unceasing aftermath.” – Publisher’s Weekly.

“Impressive . . . Inventive . . . Pushes against convention, logic, chronology . . . Ambitious and deep . . . [Prcic] succeeds at writing an unsettling and powerful novel.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Irresistible . . . Fierce, funny, and real.”—Chicago Sun-Times

Ismet Prcic (ISS-met PER-sick) or Izzy as he prefers, was born in Tuzla, Bosnia-Herzegovina, in 1977 and immigrated to America in 1996. He holds an MFA from the University of California, Irvine, and was the recipient of a 2010 NEA Award for fiction. He is also a 2011 Sundance Screenwriting Lab fellow. He lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife.

Following Prcic’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work.

Admission for the evening is $7.

New York Times Bestselling author Chelsea Cain will read from her latest book The Night Season at 7 pm Saturday November 5.

Caine’s Portland-based thrillers, described by The New York Times as “steamy and perverse,” have been published in over 30 languages, recommended on “The Today Show,” appeared in episodes of HBO’s “True Blood” and ABC’s “Castle,” named among Stephen King’s top ten favorite books of the year, and included in NPR’s list of the top 100 thrillers ever written. According to Booklist, “Popular entertainment just doesn’t get much better than this.”

So how did this “Queen of serial-killer fiction” (Kirkus Reviews) get into writing gory books? Here’s the start of an explanation.

“In retrospect I always had a fascination with the macabre.

It started with the pet cemetery. A kitten of mine was hit by a car and I buried her in an elaborate ceremony under the Rhododendron bush in our front yard in Bellingham, Washington. Months later, I came across a dead bird. I picked it up, put it in my lunchbox, carried it home and buried it under the Rhododendron.

Eventually kids in the neighborhood started hearing about the cemetery and would appear at my door cradling their dead pets. By the end of that year I had buried fifteen birds, three cats, a hamster, a rabbit, a chicken, and about a dozen gold fish. Each corpse was laid in a shoebox, cushioned with toilet paper, and presented with a piece of costume jewelry from a collection that someone had given me. I would then bury the box and say a few words to whoever was present. I had a special vintage ladies hat I would wear for the occasion. It was black, with white silk flowers piled on it, and a torn black net veil.

I was not an ordinary child.”

Get the idea that Cain won’t be an “ordinary reader?” To find out more about how the Green River Killer, Nancy Drew and TV cops shows headed Cain down the path of gory thrillers join us on November 5.

After Chelsea’s reading and Q&A we’ll have our popular Open Mic focused on the theme of “It was a dark and stormy night” at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita.

Admission for the evening is $5.

The weekend is a joint event of the Manzanita Writers’ Series/Hoffman Center and the Manzanita Business Alliance, and is made possible in part by a grant from the Tillamook County Cultural Coalition.

Jess Walter will read from his book The Financial Lives of Poets at the Manzanita Writers Series event at 7 pm on Saturday, October 15, 2011.

After hearing Jess Walter read at Wordstock 2010, the Manzanita Writer’s Series coordinators vowed to get him to come to Manzanita. He’s funny, engaging, and so-very-down-to-earth. You won’t want to miss this.

Take a look at some of the reviews of The Financial Lives of Poets.

“The hero of Jess Walter’s novel is like a stoned Humbert Humbert … The funniest way-we-live-now book of the year.” – TIME

“Brilliant–and brilliantly funny.” – ESQUIRE

“Lifts off like a rocket … This vigorous, engaging novel is one of the sharpest satires to come along in years.” — BOSTON GLOBE

“Gasp-out loud funny.” — New York Daily News

The book has been chosen in lists of best novels of the year by Time, NPR’s Fresh Air, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, The Oregonian, Kansas City Star, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Salon.com, and others.

A former National Book Award finalist and winner of the Edgar Allan Poe Award, Jess Walter is the author of five novels and one nonfiction book. His work has been translated into more than 20 languages and his essays, short fiction, criticism and journalism have been widely published, in Playboy, McSweeney’s, ESPN the Magazine, Details, Newsweek, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe among many others.

Following Walter’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work. The recommended theme for this month is “Trouble.”

Admission for the evening is $5.

The series is a program of the Hoffman Center and will be held at the Hoffman Center (across from Manzanita Library at 594 Laneda Avenue.)

Miriam Gershow leads short story workshop

Join us Saturday, September 17, 2011, from 11 to 130pm to learn how to write and publish short stories.

Spend the first half of the workshop using writing prompts to generate short story ideas. The second half will focus on how and where to place your short fiction. The fee for the workshop is $25.

Miriam Gershow is a novelist, short story writer and teacher. Her stories appear in The Georgia Review, Quarterly West, Black Warrior Review, Nimrod International Journal, The Journal, and Gulf Coast, among other journals. Miriam’s stories have been listed in the 100 Distinguished Stories of The Best American Short Stories 2007 and appeared in the 2008 Robert Olen Butler Prize Stories.

Miriam is the recipient of a Fiction Fellowship from the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, as well as an Oregon Literary Fellowship.

She received her MFA from the University of Oregon. She taught fiction writing at the University of Wisconsin as well as descriptive writing to gifted high school students through Johns Hopkins University. She currently lives in Eugene with her husband and son, where she writes and teaches writing at the University of Oregon.

Saturday evening, Gershow will read from her new novel, The Local News, at 7pm at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at the Hoffman Center.

To register for the workshop, download the registration form here.

Click here for the 2011 Schedule.   If you’re planning to attend the workshop, contact vwildauer@gmail.com.  Contact Kathie Hightower at (503) 739-1505 or kathie@jumpintolife.net for more information.

Naseem Rakha reads on Saturday, August 20

Naseem Rakha will read from her book The Crying Tree at the Manzanita Writers Series event at 7 pm on Saturday, August 20, 2011.

Set in southern Illinois and central Oregon, The Crying Tree tells a story of a mother who must overcome the hate, grief, and secrets that surround the murder of her 15-year-old son, and defy church and family as she attempts to stop the execution of the man who killed her boy.

With the heart of a storyteller, Naseem explores the death penalty and forgiveness with her audience through the lens of our justice system as well as subsequent interviews with crime victims, inmates, corrections officials and exonerated death row prisoners.

Publisher’s Weekly says, “This complex, layered story of a family’s journey toward justice and forgiveness comes together through spellbinding storytelling.”

The American Booksellers Association chose The Crying Tree for its TOP 10 Indie Next list for Reading Groups <http://news.bookweb.org/news/winter-2010-2011-indie-next-list-reading-groups> . The book has been published in six international editions.

Naseem is an award-winning author and journalist whose stories have been heard on NPR’s All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Marketplace Radio, Christian Science Monitor, and Living on Earth. She lives in Oregon with her husband, son, and many animals.

Following Rakha’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work. The recommended theme for this month is “Forgiveness.”

Admission for the evening is $5.

Further information on the Writers’ Series can be found here or contact Kathie Hightower, 503-739-1505 or Vera Wildauer at vwildauer@gmail.com.

Our first  Hoffapalooza, held Saturday, July 23, 2011 was conceived as an opportunity to show off the wide variety of programs that go on at the Hoffman Center, and to show them off all at once. In a six-hour timespan we had hundreds of people come through the building. A frequent comment, even from full-locals, was, “I had no idea there was this much going on.” It was great to hear that. It meant we were successful.

Check the gallery for some photos of the big day.

John Daniel to read on July 16th

John Daniel will read from his new book The Far Corner: Northwestern Views on Land, Life, and Literature at the Manzanita Writers’ Series event at 7pm on Saturday, July 16, 2011 at the Hoffman Center.

As Wallace Stegner describes Daniel: “John Daniel loves wilderness of all kinds, …, but it is more than scenery he is after. He has a streak of mysticism, some generalized religious sense, that is stimulated by the natural world…his essays will win him devoted readers.”

 Daniel is the author of nine books of memoir, personal essays, and poetry. He has been a Wallace Stegner Fellow in Poetry at Stanford University, a James Thurber Writer-in-Residence at Ohio State University, and a Research and Writing Fellow at Oregon State University’s Center for the Humanities. He has been a Writer-in-Residence or Visiting Professor at a number of other universities. Two of his books have won the Oregon Book Award and he has won the Andres Berger Award for Creative Nonfiction, the annual John Burroughs Nature Essay Award, and a Pushcart Prize, among other honors.

Following Daniel’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work. The recommended theme for this month is “Something Wild.”

Admission for the evening is $5.

The Hoffman Center in Manzanita host its first Hoffapalooza Saturday, July 23 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. to highlight and celebrate the programs and activities that take place at north Tillamook County’s art, culture and education center.

“We’ve been making physical and program improvements to the Center over the past few months and felt the summertime would be a great opportunity to show off what we’re all about,” said event organizer and board member John Freethy. “Considering the scope of what goes on here, ‘Hoffapalooza’ seemed a great name for the event.”

Visitors will be invited to explore a number of family-friendly activities, including clay, drawing, writing, reading, drama, music, letterpress, and book and paper arts. Program volunteers will be on hand to demonstrate and discuss each activity.

“Hoffapalooza” will also feature performances throughout the day by local musicians, dramatic or comic presentations, and raffle prizes.  Local artists and students of the center will also have their art on display and for sale.  There’s no admission to the event, however proceeds of the raffle and art sales go to the Hoffman Center operating fund.

Jennifer Lauck to lead scene writing workshop

Join us Saturday, June 18, 2011, from 10am to 3pm for a highly interactive workshop to learn scene writing in seven steps!

Learn the key ingredients to formulating the single most important aspect of good writing – the scene. Jennifer has created a recipe all writers can follow in order to create juicy, tactile, focused and depth-filled scenes. All levels and all genres welcome. Plus, all workshop participants will receive a free copy of Jennifer’s audio series Writing Life: How to Write a Memoir and Free Your Self, a $35 value. Find out more here–http://www.jenniferlauck.com/writing_life.php

To register for Scene Writing in Seven Steps, download the registration form. Simply bring along the completed form to the workshop with a check for $50. Important, please email vwildauer@gmail.com to let us know if you plan on coming.

Saturday evening, Lauck will read from her latest book, Found: A Memoir, at 7pm at the Hoffman Center.

Jennifer Lauck is an award winning journalist and the author of the New York Times Bestseller Blackbird. Featured on The Oprah Show, Winfrey told her audience, “this should have been a Book of the Month book. Read it now!”

Blackbird has been translated into twenty-two languages and made the bestseller list in London, Ireland and Spain. Lauck has traveled throughout England, Scotland, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Holland, to speak about her writing. Lauck was given the Book Sense 76 award and was featured in Newsweek, Harper’s Bazaar, Talk Magazine, People, Glamour and Writer’s Digest. She was a select USA Today pick and nominated for two Oregon Book Awards.

Her new book, Found: A Memoir, came out in March 2011. It is a sequel to Blackbird and is about the search and reunion with her birth mother.

For further information, contact Vera Wildauer at 971-344-5691 or email vwildauer@gmail.com).

Jennifer Lauck to lead scene writing workshop

Join us Saturday, June 18, 2011, from 10am to 3pm to learn scene writing in seven steps!

Learn the key ingredients to formulating the single most important aspect of good writing – the scene. Jennifer has created a recipe all writers can follow in order to create juicy, tactile, focused and depth-filled scenes. All levels and all genres welcome.

Jennifer Lauck is an award winning journalist and the author of the New York Times Bestseller Blackbird. Featured on The Oprah Show, Winfrey told her audience, “this should have been a Book of the Month book. Read it now!”

Her new book, Found: A Memoir, came out in March 2011. It is a sequel to Blackbird and is about the search and reunion with her birth mother.

Click here to download the registration form for Scene Writing in Seven Steps. Tuition is $50.

Saturday evening, Lauck will read from her latest book, Found: A Memoir, at 7pm at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at the Hoffman Center.

The workshop and series are programs of the Hoffman Center and will be held at the Hoffman Center (across from Manzanita Library at 594 Laneda Avenue.) (Further information and the 2011 schedule are available at hoffmanblog.org <http://hoffmanblog.org> online or contact Vera Wildauer at 971-344-5691 or email vwildauer@gmail.com).

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